I watched an old movie last night called 'A Face in The Crowd' from 1957.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050371/
I was interested to watch this after reading about the director:
'Kazan was raised in the
Greek Orthodox Church and attended Greek Orthodox services every Sunday, where he had to stand for several hours with his father. His mother read the Bible but did not go to church. When Kazan was about eight years old, the family moved to
New Rochelle, New York, and his father sent him to a
Catholic catechism school because there was no Orthodox church nearby.'
I thought this rare in Hollywood and also I thought the premise was interesting - basically a drunk guy is taken from prison by a radio producer and he becomes a star for his takes and opinions and raw salt of the earth quality.
He then rises to power and influence while eventually losing what originally made him who he was.
It's an old tale but it's also one that has become more relevant in the age of the internet and 'influencers.' A lot of liberals will read into this as an attack on the orange man as in particular there is a plot point about him potentially gaining political influence and riling up red necks to revolt. Yet the actual destructive power of influence is more on the left in the modern world - not something the movie addresses which diminishes it's reflection of the current times to an extent.
I then started to think to myself 'Why would a Catholic or Orthodox man make a movie like this?' Since it seems to cynical about the ease of which we can manipulate people. It got me thinking about that and then I checked the screenwriter - Budd Schulberg. He is a J writer who also wrote a novel titled 'What Makes Sammy Run?' in which a dastardly character basically cheats and deceives his way to the top. The book was accused of being anti-semitic despite being written by a J.
It got me thinking that the movie is also about this as much as a 'tragic' rise and fall story it's more of a depiction that people can be easily led, the masses are dumb. There's actually a contempt for ordinary people in this movie that makes it appear particularly cold in a way. The masses are basically just these nodding dogs sat in front of their screens or radios.
You come away from this movie not feeling too good about humanity. The lead performances are good though there's a lot of screaming. It's well plotted and structured as 1950s movies certainly were compared to today.
It's worth watching for a universal message but it also doesn't have a feel good quality and when the credits roll you start to think you either watched something too 'real' about how idiotic people are or not real enough in which the writer absolutely despises masses and both feelings are uncomfortable ones. Perhaps that means it's art at least rather than shmaltz.
